Bridging the Gap
by SETI-fan
Summary: During a quiet morning around the firehouse, Patty and Holtzmann bond over stories of the past and bad math puns.


**This is actually the first Ghostbusters fic I started writing, but I never could quite find the rhythm of it and I spent so long poring over it I stopped being able to tell if it was working or not. After putting it aside for a month or two and looking at it fresh, I was able to see what it needed and I think it's finally in decent shape.**

 **Basically this was an excuse to explore ideas about Patty's backstory, but also to play with the fun dynamic between Holtz and Patty. Enjoy!**

* * *

Patty still had a moment of startled confusion every time she woke up at the firehouse. Although all of the girls had kept their own apartments, they had taken over rooms in the top floor of the firehouse to have a place to crash after late night busts when no one wanted to commute home. While Patty didn't relish the idea of sleeping directly above a nuclear laboratory, she knew better than most that some nights it definitely was a safer option than braving the subway.

Besides, the company was certainly better here. She had had a number of iffy roommates over the years, family and Craigslist both, so having three she actually genuinely liked was a nice change of pace. She might be startled out of sleep by fire alarms or small explosions sometimes, but at least none of them brought drugs around or ate her food in the fridge.

When her brain cleared enough to remember where she was and why she was there, Patty stretched and sluggishly made her way out of her bunk. The sun was already up and she could hear activity downstairs, so apparently she was the last one up that morning. Given how late they were out extracting a particularly ugly ghost from a warehouse that night, she wasn't surprised she'd needed a lazy morning to recover.

Pulling on the robe she kept at the station, Patty made her way down to the common area they had set up. She saw Erin and Abby sitting at a table talking intently over a book and smiled. She was glad the two had worked out their business. It was always sad to see a friendship end, especially over ridiculousness.

Speaking of ridiculousness, Patty saw Holtzmann sitting with her feet kicked up on a desk, soldering at some piece of technology she had brought downstairs, her music and an unsettling glow carrying across the room. None of them were one hundred percent sure when Holtzmann truly slept other than the times they found her catnapping around the lab or in the new Ecto-1. Patty swore the girl was actually powered by the nuclear energy around her and just recharged as she worked. Either way, her surprising mix of calm and chaos had become a familiar, if slightly worrying presence in Patty's life.

"Morning, ladies," Patty called.

Erin and Abby called back distracted echoes. Holtzmann made some kind of greeting noise, not looking up.

"G'morning."

Patty jumped at the voice right next to her. "Jeez, Kev, don't do that."

"Sorry." He shrugged from his spot beside the coffee maker.

"What are you doing lurking over there?"

"Ah, well, I am trying to learn to like coffee." He raised his mug to his lips and almost immediately sprayed it back out again. "Ugh. Not there yet."

"Okay. Well, leave some for those of us who do like it," Patty said carefully, pouring herself a cup that was outside the splash zone. "And clean up when you're done, okay? All we need's someone slipping and cracking their head down here, like this place isn't a lawsuit waiting to happen already."

He gave her a smile and a thumbs up before taking another swig and spitting it back out.

"Boy, you lucky you're pretty," Patty muttered into her mug as she turned back to the room.

Erin and Abby seemed to be avidly discussing something about ectoplasm and Patty didn't feel right intruding on their Ghost Girls vibe. Holtzmann was engrossed in her own little world, but looked like she had been that way for quite a while considering she was wearing the same shirt she had been when they got in last night, so Patty poured a cup of orange juice from the fridge and wandered over her way.

"Hey, baby, I'm playing a hunch your body hasn't seen a vitamin in a few days."

"Thanks, Pats," Holtzmann said, eyes not leaving her work.

Patty set the cup on her table far enough from anything electric to avoid immediate risk of electrocution, figuring she'd notice it eventually. "You having fun?"

Holtzmann squinted at the solder line she was making on the device. "Well, the protons are jumping and this cyclotron's purring like a satiated jungle cat, so I am having fun indeed," she grinned, looking up at Patty briefly.

Patty just nodded, sipping her coffee. "Well, you're a weird little person, but I'm glad you're happy."

Holtzmann beamed, returning to her work. "We're all a little mad here," she crooned in a sing-song voice, eyebrows rising behind her goggles.

"Ain't that the truth," Patty muttered, glancing back at Kevin barely missing the phone with his latest mouthful of coffee and Abby attempting to get Erin to touch a jar filled with ectoplasm.

"Good thing we've got you around here to bring the normal," Holtzmann mused.

"I don't know, I gave up a steady job to fight ghosts for a living, so I'm not sure I'd call myself normal."

"Well, relative to the rest of us." Holtzmann grinned warmly at her. "Popular Patty, willing to hang out with the weirdos."

Patty snorted. "What makes you think I was ever popular?"

Confusion wrinkled Holtzmann's brow. "The fact that you're incredibly nice and fun to be around?"

That brought a little smile to Patty's face. "Well, I appreciate that, but just 'cause I wasn't into science didn't mean I was one of the popular kids. You think I read a lot now, you should've seen me in school. At recess, the teachers had to take my books away so I would go play with the other kids." She still was a bit mad about that, but at least she'd gotten them all back when recess was over each day.

"Yeah," Holtz said thoughtfully, turning off the soldering iron and leaning back in her chair. "I used to sneak back into the science lab after lunch so they had to drag me outside."

Patty shook her head. "God, I can just imagine a little version of you, running around, taking things apart."

"To be fair, it's not that far from what I'm like now," Holtzmann smirked. "You're good with people. I'd have thought you'd be into social stuff."

"Oh, don't get me wrong, I wasn't shy. It's just all I wanted to talk about was the cool stuff I'd been reading about. Any idea how many kids want to hear someone talk about history all day?"

Holtz wrinkled her nose, calculating in her head. "Admittedly not every kid is as cool as I was, but I'd still guess…five?"

"Try zero," Patty said, shaping an 'O' with her fingers. She waved off the sudden sympathy in Holtzmann's eyes. "Don't worry, I had friends. Eventually I figured out nobody cared about that stuff the way I did and learned to keep it to a minimum. But if I learned something really cool I couldn't help myself, you know? So it still came out. Enough to be Boring Patty for a while there."

Holtzmann's face had gone very serious. "Those kids didn't know what they were talking about. You could never be boring."

Patty smiled. "Thanks, baby. Fortunately, you're not the only one who thought so. My parents weren't that into history, but they did believe in supporting whatever us kids were excited about. When we'd be walking to the park or a store, my dad would read all the plaques on the buildings and statues to me until I could read them on my own. It'd drive the other kids crazy on field trips when I wanted to read all the signs, but when my parents were there they'd just wait patiently, letting me stay until I finished them all. I could've given a tour by the end of those trips. But hey, they believed learning was important and you should take every chance at knowledge you can get."

She realized Holtzmann was listening to her with a focus she usually reserved for her work. "They sound like great people," she said softly.

"They're pretty cool, yeah. You'll have to meet them sometime." Patty could only imagine how interesting that meeting would be. At least her uncle hadn't seen what Holtz had done to his hearse before it wound up in the ghost world…

"So, why didn't you go into teaching?" Holtzmann asked, munching on a Pringle. "I might actually have enjoyed History with you teaching it."

"Eh, a bunch of reasons," Patty shrugged, sipping her coffee as she leaned back against another desk. "Money's always a big one. We weren't broke or anything, but I know raising three kids in the city isn't cheap, and my parents weren't able to go to college so they had to work a lot of hours just to keep us going. My sister's _smart_. Like, you guys smart. She got a full scholarship and went into nursing. She's out saving lives now. My brother knew business, so he split time working and going to school and he's running a restaurant these days.

"Now me? I was _good_ at history, but my grades in everything else weren't good enough for a free ride anywhere. I got a few little scholarship things that helped, but had to work and get loans for the rest. Figured with a degree I'd start working in a museum or maybe teach or something."

She realized she'd started rambling for quite a while, but Holtzmann just nodded, seeming genuinely interested in her story.

"Well, anyway, you know grad school costs even more money and, same thing, I only got offered partial scholarships 'cause I was so busy working and being good in my classes who has time to write dozens of essays and applications too, right?" Patty sighed, thumb rubbing the rim of her mug. "And then my dad needed surgery. He's okay now, but had to miss work for almost a year. My brother and sister sent money and I moved back home to help him and Mom. 'Cause they'd always been there for us, right? So I don't regret it for a minute.

"But then the loans needed paying and when I did move back out I needed rent and a Bachelor's in History gets you nothing these days, so I just took what jobs I could to pay the bills. Never had time to go back and get a teacher certification or anything, but the MTA gave benefits and kept a roof over my head and they didn't care if I read in my spare time, so…" She shrugged, trailing off.

Holtzmann took a swig of the juice Patty had brought her. "Plus it led you right where you were meant to be," she grinned.

Patty smiled back warmly. "Yeah, it did do that."

"You know, we've got time and money now," Holtz said, trading the glass for her Pringles can. "If you ever want to go back for any of those degrees, we'll all help you out."

"Yeah?" Patty said, arching an eyebrow.

"Sure. Cover for you on busts, hack into a school's computers to make it look like you already paid tuition…"

"That…really isn't necessary," Patty interrupted.

Holtzmann shrugged. "Your call. Of course, now that you're a famous Ghostbuster, you can probably do guest lectures at universities no matter what degree you have. Worth looking into." She winked at her. "Your genius deserves to be appreciated."

Patty didn't know what to say to that. She had genuinely given up the thought of ever getting back into college and she honestly wouldn't leave the Ghostbusters even if somewhere offered her a position, but still her mind whirled a bit at the idea she _could_ …

Holtzmann straightened up suddenly as a new song started on the radio. "Hold that thought."

Patty watched in curious puzzlement as Holtzmann began carefully arranging a set of Pringles on the table to the rhythm of an Ace of Base song. She delicately balanced them, face-up, then face-down, each resting on the edges of the chips around it to form a wavy line.

"Hey," she called, getting Erin and Abby to look over. Holtzmann proudly gestured to her sculpture, singing, "I saw the sine…"

Erin gave a little laugh, nodding appreciatively, if a bit bemused.

Abby beamed, laughing loudly. "Nice one, Holtz! New _wave_ music!"

Kevin leaned over from his desk, looking. "Oh, I get it. 'Cause they're the ace of potato chips, right?"

"Thanks for playing, Kev," Holtzmann said cheerfully, aiming fingerguns his way. Looking back up, she noticed Patty waiting out the joke and started to explain, "A sine wave is when—"

Patty waved her off, appreciative she wanted to include her though. "It's a math thing. I know. It's okay."

"No, no." Holtzmann tapped the desk, looking agitated as if she was trying to solve a problem. "Hell Gate!" she blurted suddenly.

Patty jumped, instinctively looking behind her. "You serious?"

Holtz chuckled, grabbing her arm to draw her attention back forward. "Hell Gate _Bridge_."

"What?" Patty swatted Holtzmann's shoulder. "Girl, don't just shout stuff like that around here! We've seen a damn Hell Gate!"

Holtzmann ducked her hand, unperturbed. "But you know what I'm talking about, right?"

"That bridge between Queens and Manhattan? Longest steel arch bridge in the world until Bayonne Bridge opened?"

"Probably." She picked up a Pringle, holding it so it created an arch. "The road is passing through the middle of a parabolic arch. So at one side of the river, the curve starts at water level, rises up through the road until it peaks, and curves back down to the water again at the other side. If you imagine an engineer with much cooler ideas than the one who really built it continued that curve…" She picked up a second chip and held it upside-down, picking up from the edge of the last one. "…so the line kept curving down underground on the other side and came back up again, that'd be a sine wave."

Patty nodded, dusty memories of middle school algebra surfacing from the depths of her mind.

"Now, let's imagine the engineer got even more creative and started the bridge mid-arch instead of at the bottom so everything's off by half a wavelength and the middle's down below water level. Then you've got a cosine. So then—"

"Hey," Patty cut in, seeing an opportunity, "can I stop you before you go off on a tangent?"

For a second, she realized the joke didn't land. The surprised, slightly embarrassed look in the other woman's eyes hurt her heart as she realized Holtzmann had also probably been told sometimes in her life to hush up because no one else was interested in what she was on about.

But then Patty saw it click and Holtzmann's face nearly split in half with overjoyed excitement. "Pat- _ty_! Bringing it with a math _and_ English pun!" She raised her hand and gave Patty a cracking high-five that left her palm stinging.

Patty grinned smugly, leaning back against the desk again. "Hey, just 'cause it wasn't my thing doesn't mean I don't know a little something."

"You are a never-ending well of surprises, Pats," Holtzmann beamed. She picked up one of her demo chips to crunch into. "We should go there."

Patty cocked her head. "Where? The bridge?"

"Yeah." Holtzmann grinned. "Bring some lunch, I can talk about the engineering, you can tell me all of its scandalous history. It'd be fun."

Patty looked over Holtzmann's casually charming expression and genuinely believed she wasn't just humoring her. "You know what, that does sound nice. Why not?"

"Great! It's a date!"

Holtz had already turned back to her work before Patty could ask if she meant that literally or was just using the idiom. Her curiosity was disrupted when she saw Holtzmann scoop up a Pringle off her desk that was covered in a dusting of metal shavings.

"Baby, you've got a whole fresh tube. Don't eat those nasty ones you've been playing with. Come on, now."

Holtzmann scrutinized the chip in her hand, then shrugged. "I've consumed far more hazardous substances."

"Okay, see, that's not actually reassuring," Patty said, taking the Pringle from her fingers.

"It's inert and well below lethal dose!" Holtzmann protested. "No need to waste!"

"I will buy you an entire case of these things if you promise to stop eating the garbage." Patty swept the rest of the contaminated chips into a trash can.

"Yeah?" Holtzmann rolled her eyes with an exaggerated pout. "All right, you win."

"Hey, don't get mad at me for wanting to keep you around as long as possible."

As she looked up, she saw Holtz actually appearing to be at a loss for what to say, her eyes looking surprised and a bit moved behind her yellow lenses.

Before she could respond, though, Kevin called from his desk. "Hey, bosses? Someone just called. Sounds like it's a third class…magnificent…ecto…gasm?" he hazarded.

The sentimental look disappeared as Holtzmann's eyes and wicked grin went huge with excitement.

"I'm going to hope that's your words and not the client's," Abby said. "All right, let's load up."

As Patty dumped the rest of her coffee and headed for her locker, Holtzmann followed, setting the machine she had been repairing on the desk. "So, what'll you get me if I start wearing more protective gear around the radioactive material?"

"If that's something you should be doing anyway, it means you _won't_ be getting an earful from me about cancer rates."

Holtz grinned as she sidled past Patty, briefly turning in the door to the garage to give her a wink. "If our date goes well, maybe you'll give me an earful anyway."

Patty paused in her tracks as Holtzmann continued out the doorway. That shouldn't be sexy. It sounded kind of disgusting and barely made any sense, but the way Holtz could say things made almost everything sound like sex talk. The swagger in her step on the way out certainly wasn't hurting the effect.

Damn.

Taking her uniform down from its hanger, Patty shook her head. Her life certainly had come a long way in a very short time, but as baffling and dangerous and bizarre as it was, Holtzmann was absolutely right: she was where she was meant to be. And even though she'd probably be complaining when they got back from this bust exhausted and covered in slime, she knew she wouldn't go back to her old life for anything.


End file.
